The U.S. Department of Defense has just placed an order for $6.6 million in active RFID technology from Savi, a Lockheed Martin company. The order comes under the Defense Department’s RFID III procurement contract, a multiple award, indefinite-delivery-indefinite-quantity contract with a total value of $429.4 million.

The RFID tags, which are affixed to cargo containers and other supply chain assets, comply with the ISO 18000-7 standard (also called DASH7), enabling real-time supply visibility and interoperability with allied defense forces and government organizations.

The contract includes orders for the Savi ST-654, which is an ISO 18000-7 compliant active RFID tag widely used to track shipping containers, vehicles and other large assets, and the Savi ST-621, (also ISO 18000-7 compliant), which is a lower-cost, license plate tag designed for quick commissioning that is ideal for tracking shipping containers, rolling stock and other conveyances.

For the past dozen years, Savi has helped to build the the agency’s In-Transit Visibility network, which is the world’s largest active RFID-based cargo tracking system spanning more than 4,000 nodes across more than 40 countries.

Savi is a founding member of the DASH7 Alliance, a broad coalition of technology developers, manufacturers, test laboratories and government organizations committed to proliferating the commercial use of wireless sensor networks based on the ISO 18000-7 standard.